Ms Mary Harney:

Well, can I ... sometimes I think we've become a bit obsessed with structures, and I think both Governor Honohan in his report, and I think Mr. Patterson, when he was before this committee, whilst they had issues with the structure, did say that the structure wasn't the reason why mistakes were made, and I would agree with that view. I think we can become a little bit obsessed with how things look, rather that what we do. I think if there's anything I would say reflecting back, and I don't intend for one moment to scapegoat anyone, because I think, collectively, we all failed, but I think it's more to do with the culture. The reason I was so keen to have a new regulatory environment was partly because of the cultural issues that I experienced. As I said, customers of banks were ... had hidden charges imposed on them. They were being helped set up bogus non-resident accounts to avoid tax. I knew in the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment that we certainly didn't have the resources to deal with a modern insurance industry and I was very worried that what had happened in '85 could happen again, and that's why we sought to move that into a different era. Many of the people on that committee recommended a greenfield site, and that had attractions to me initially. But I think, given the involvement of the ECB, given the fact that we were part of a monetary union and the particular responsibilities that fall on the Governor, and, as I said, what was more of concern to me was what they did rather than who did it.